It turned out that starting this year, the middle school exam shifted from a citywide to a provincial joint exam.
Linguang Province has a total of seven prefecture-level cities.
The level of students also varied due to different educational resources in the cities.
In these cities, Zhuancheng’s development level was quite decent, ranking third or fourth.
The best naturally was the capital city of Linguang Province—Linguang City.
Although Zhuancheng No. 1 Middle School was a fairly good school in Zhuancheng, it wasn’t outstanding on a provincial scale.
Not to mention the junior secondary division, but talking solely about the senior secondary division.
As the teaching quality of Zhuancheng No. 1 Middle School improved, the number of students admitted to universities each year had increased from a mere few to thirty or forty.
However, Linguang No.1 Middle School had over a hundred students gaining university admissions every year.
Among them were many admitted to the nation’s top universities.
The principal sighed and told the truth in front of these smart kids.
"Actually, this year’s college entrance exam scores from our school weren’t particularly outstanding, although you all saw on the honor roll that a student named Jiang Jingze was admitted to Minghua University, but he was the only standout, and there was really nothing we could do. Everyone is a good kid, but sometimes that’s just how the educational gap is."
Yue Qingqing expressed her understanding, noting the gap between Zhuancheng No. 1 Middle School and Linguang No.1 Middle School was probably like that between Zhuancheng No. 1 Middle School and Daye Village School.
Although all teachers are good, the gap in teaching experience is there, and the learning atmosphere for the students is also completely different.
The principal spoke with a heavy voice, "This year’s joint middle school exam is also a competition among several cities, and we discussed among several schools and hope that each school selects a few talented students. The city’s best teachers will provide guidance on weekends. We hope you can honor the city by performing well."
The principal looked around and continued, "Of course, this coaching class is free and entirely voluntary, and it’s okay if anyone has other commitments; there’s no compulsion."
The principal didn’t speak very fast, but after he finished, the office fell silent, as if everyone hadn’t quite reacted yet.
The principal’s intention was actually easy to understand. During regular exams, classes would compete against each other, let alone cities.
Previously, Zhuancheng No. 1 Middle School was always compared with a few other middle schools, but this year, they had to unite and confront outsiders together.
This thought led to the idea of gathering the best-performing children from each school to give them some focused teaching.
Zhuang Lan glanced at Yue Qingqing and was the first to speak.
"I would like to participate."
The principal nodded happily, "I have always heard that Student Zhuang is very diligent."
With a leader, the rest naturally agreed one after another.
Although the principal’s words were not very stirring, they still got the children all fired up.
Who wouldn’t be moved when tasked with the honor of shining for the entire city?
Yue Qingqing and Qu Ruorui nodded as well.
This was a great opportunity to improve themselves, especially since they could study with top students from other schools, which was a very interesting proposition.
Seeing the children agree, the principal was in a good mood but didn’t forget to remind them.
"Since it’s the first year of a joint exam, we suspect the difficulty of the middle school examination questions will step up, allowing for a baseline assessment of students’ levels across several cities. This also means there should be some very difficult final questions, so you all need to work hard."
The ones chosen were already the top students in the school.
Upon hearing this, not a single person shrank back; instead, everyone was rubbing their hands together, very excited.
The principal then casually mentioned, "This time, other schools also have very outstanding seeds, so we also need to strive for some prestige for No.1."
The students couldn’t help but smile.
It seemed that before competing with students from other cities, they would have to compete with other schools first.
Competition is indeed everywhere.
As she was leaving, Yue Qingqing sensed the principal’s gaze on her.
She couldn’t help but feel tense.
In the seventh and eighth grades, she had always been the first in the school.
She understood that the principal and teachers had high expectations of her.